Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

Wednesday, October 7, 2015

I Miss Pooping Alone

The ability
to privately evacuate one’s bowels in one’s own home would appear to be a
given, and it was, before my son became a toddler. Now, despite my attempts to
clandestinely slip away for a solitary colonic egress, my son always seems to
realize what is transpiring.

Cell phone
in hand, I will just have begun to prepare for deployment when the door-knob slowly
begins to turn. Invariably, I react to this by remaining
motionless. I suppose I still operate under the misguided assumption that, like
the T-Rex, my son’s vision is based on movement and that somehow if I remain
still my presence will not register.

Alas, this
has yet to work. Instead, I will see his adorable face peek around the door while
showcasing his I-know-what-daddy-is-doing grin. In the majority of cases, he
will enter and close the door behind him. In a large space this would be simply
uncomfortable, but in our master bathroom the toilet resides in its own closet.
This means that there is barely enough room for a seated adult to clear their
legs with the door. So my son’s insistence on witnessing the watery interment
of Taco Tuesday quickly becomes a logistical nightmare.

Once inside
the shire, he will remove several squares of toilet paper (the quantity appears
to correlate to the session’s intensity) and gently place them into the coiled
remnants of my trousers. Once an acceptable surplus has been amassed, he will
insist upon leaving which necessitates another stance adjustment.

Once he
emerges from the restroom, we enter the proclamation phase whereby he runs
through the house announcing that “Daddy made a biiiiiiiiiiiiig poo-poo!” This
phase generally concludes once everyone in the house has acknowledged receipt
of this information and replied accordingly.

Not one to
leave a job unfinished, he will return at the conclusion of my digestive
evacuation in order to officiate the send-off. This normally entails a solemn
flushing ritual followed by a jovial “bye-bye poo-poo!” The only pageantry missing
is a formal salute and a lone bugler.

Despite the
intrusive nature of a toddler’s presence during such a delicate time, I realize
that one day (once he has moved out and begun a lucrative career as an hologram surgeon) I will miss the company. I suppose at that point I will
simply have to walk through the house announcing my own bowel movements.